Week 13 in Review

Greetings from Room 119!  It's hard to believe that we are already in the month of December! We had an unexpected fire drill early in the week.  It was not planned but it was good to know that we could exit the building quickly and quietly.  

We began a new unit in math all about measurement.  Mrs. D. shared a video her son made about measurement and we learned that you can measure things in a lot of different ways.  As a class we brainstormed all the ways you could measure something and came up with: time, length, weight and temperature. Mrs. D. told us we measure things in standard ways (inches, days, pounds, degrees...).  We also learned you can measure things using nonstandard measurement such as your hands, your feet and even other objects.  You can also compare to objects (for example, what is taller, shorter or about the same size).

In word study we learned about the "Long E" sound.  A long vowel is one that says its name.  We talked about three common ways you see the Long E sound written in words.  During Readers' Workshop, one of the things we did this week was look for Long E words in the books we read and record them.  We found A LOT of words!

 Did you know our school will be hosting a Scholastic Book Fair next week?  We will be going during our media center time on Tuesday.  If you would like us to buy a book, please send money in a zip lock bag with our name clearly marked on it and put it in our Everyday Folder.  Please remind us not to share our money with our friends and let us know if you would like us to use our money on books or other items (pencils, posters, etc.)  If you ever want to buy a book from Scholastic, please go to Mrs. Doran's blog and click on the link directly below our theme song. You can search for specific titles and authors and the order will be shipped directly to school.

One day some of us may become authors.  Our writing continues to improve.  We took the lists and brainstorms we learned about last week and learned how they can help us include more detail in our writing. Mrs. Doran was happy to see that instead of trying out just the new things she introduces in workshop, we are remembering things from old lessons too, and just adding to what we know and making it better!

One of the coolest things for Mrs. D. is when we make connections in what we're learning about to things we read about.  Luke was reading a book that compared the size of an alligators nest to the size of children.  Comparing sizes was something we had worked on earlier in the week.  He shared it with the class during our math workshop.  It is fun to see all of our learning come together.

Our week ended with a visit from a Mystery Reader.  Luke's dad came in and had time to read us two books.  Though Friday afternoons can get pretty loud and exciting, we did a great job listening to the story and were even able to pull out some rhyme in the books he read.  Mrs. D. is still waiting for two families to sign up for a Mystery Reader time slot and then she will open up the remaining Mystery Reader times first come first serve.

As always, there is a video below that you can watch. You can also watch by clicking HERE if you are reading this via email.  Also, please know that Mrs. D. will not be in school on Monday the 3rd.  The copy machine was acting funny so she was unable to copy books for our homework.  She hopes that she will be able to copy them when she returns on Monday.  Math and writing homework will come home as regularly scheduled.  Thanks for your understanding!